Siren

"You see, child? You chose to follow a False Shepherd, and he has led you astray! What I do, I do for love! What lion does not cringe to see their cub in pain? But spare the rod, spoil the child! If you won't listen to me, perhaps you will listen to your mother!"

―Comstock, to Elizabeth

The Siren is a powerful enemy that Booker DeWitt encounters in Columbia. Suspended in a state of simultaneous life and death, the Siren displays a host of unnatural powers, chiefly among them the ability to reanimate other corpses via a unique form of Tear manipulation.

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When Booker and Elizabeth find themselves forcibly landed in Emporia, they set out to reach Comstock House, seat of the Prophet, Zachary Comstock. The gate, however, is sealed shut and under a fingerprint lock. The two then resolve to visit Lady Comstock's grave, pay their respects, and remove her hand so as to open the way. Comstock, however, had anticipated this move, and constructed a miniature Siphon in his wife's grave, which he activates upon their arrival. The device momentarily weakens Elizabeth, and reanimates Lady Comstock as a twisted version of her former self: the Siren. Suspended between life and death, she violently rejects Elizabeth as her daughter and attacks Booker, using her powers to raise the dead in the graves nearby. After a difficult battle she retreats, treading invisibly through Emporia with only her footsteps revealing her presence. The Lutecetwins advise Booker and Elizabeth to find three Tears that reveal the truth behind Lady Comstock's death. Upon the discovery of these Tears, Elizabeth realizes that she is not Lady Comstock's daughter: Father Comstock, sterile due to prolonged exposure to the Luteces' machines, had brought her in through a Tear. Blinded by jealousy, Lady Comstock accused him and Rosalind Lutece of having an affair, and threatened to reveal his secret to the rest of the city. Desperate to keep her silent, Comstock ordered the murder of his wife and the Lutece twins, framing Daisy Fitzroy for the former and disguising the latter as an accident. As Elizabeth and Booker piece together the evidence, they are beset once again by the Siren at the Bank of the Prophet.

At the gate to Comstock House, Elizabeth pleads with the Siren, apologizing for her suffering and revealing that her current torment is partially due to Elizabeth's own fear and mistrust of her as Lady Comstock. The plea falls on deaf ears, however, and the Siren attacks Booker one last time. Elizabeth then reveals to her the truth behind her death, freeing her of her anger. Finally at peace, the Siren blasts open the gate to Comstock House.

The Siren is encountered three times: once in the Memorial Gardens, upon Lady Comstock's resurrection, once in the Bank of the Prophet after discovering the Tear there, and a final time in Victory Square, in front of Comstock Gate.

Resurrection: The Siren's most spectacular skill is her ability to resurrect the dead soldiers via Tears: if there are any corpses around she will levitate them and let out a piercing scream, bringing them back to life.

Deadly Voice: The Siren will frequently try to approach Booker before letting out a deafening, banshee-like wail dealing heavy damage in an area around her. Moreover, the scream will push Booker back and disrupt his aim.

Intangibility: The Siren can momentarily disappear in a puff of smoke before reappearing at another location, rendering her immune to damage. Additionally, she moves by levitating through the air and can easily reach elevated terrain.

Self-Healing: While resurrecting minions the Siren heals herself for 15% of her maximum health, and increases her maximum health by 2%.

It is important to note that the Siren will only be able to raise the dead if there is a corpse left to resurrect. Disintegrating an enemy through combustion or electricity will prevent them from being brought back. Decapitated enemies, however, can still be resurrected.

Killing the Siren's minions without disposing of them as per the above is a waste of resources, as she can bring them back almost instantly. Instead, it is better to focus on the Siren herself, and whittle down her health as fast as possible. Defeating her will also kill all of her minions.

The Siren will go out of her way to get close to Booker. Use this to isolate her from her personal army.

The Siren's area of effect attack has a small charge-up time, which will allow a quick player to run out of its damaging range. An even quicker player can also take advantage of this by shooting her while she's still floating. She is equally vulnerable when resurrecting the dead, though the corpses she levitates can protect her.

As the Siren tends to move around frequently, use weapons that don't require much accuracy to deal damage.

Both the Pig Flak and the Hail Fire can severely damage the Siren in a short amount of time. The Pig Flak works slightly better than the Hail Fire, as the added damage and clip size are more advantageous than the Hail Fire's bouncing grenades.

Both the China Broom and the Heater are good choices against the Siren. Though the Heater's incendiary effect is completely ineffective against the Siren herself, it has the potential to incinerate her minions, preventing her from resurrecting them.

The RPG is effective at tearing a large chunk out of the Siren's health, and can clear out entire groups of her minions at a time, but its limited clip size and projectile travel time (unless Speed Boost has been purchased) means the player will run out of ammunition before defeating the Siren.

The Triple R and Repeater, due to their large magazine size, are effective against the Siren. The Repeater's greater damage per shot and stability makes it significantly better than the former in this situation.

The Siren is completely immune to most Vigors. Charge is the only Vigor capable of significantly damaging her, and, when fully upgraded, can help by recharging the player's shields and damaging any surrounding minions. Ramming is an even more potent strategy when combined with the Gear Burning Halo.

Combining Undertow with Shock Jockey is significantly recommended when fighting the Siren, as the combo will disintegrate any affected minions. If both Vigors are upgraded to affect multiple enemies at a time, this method becomes the most efficient way to clear the battlefield of resurrected enemies.

Devil's Kiss is also an excellent Vigor against her, and has the added benefit of being able to burn enemies to ash. Though the Siren herself only takes moderate damage from it, throwing down a fire bomb or laying a fire trap can decimate crowds of tightly-grouped minions.

Bucking Bronco can be used to keep minions at bay while taking on the Siren.

Use Return to Sender to protect yourself whenever possible, particularly when the zombies are attacking you or gang up around you.

Any Gear with an electrical or fire effect is particularly useful when fighting the Siren, as it will help permanently dispose of the dead she resurrects.

Overkill is effective when fighting groups of minions, as it will shock every nearby enemy and disintegrate the primary target. Furthermore, the effect chains, and so can work as a Vigor-free alternative to Shock Jockey.

Storm, combined with the above Gear and Vigors, can reduce the Salts cost of attacking the enemies the Siren raises while simultaneously clearing groups of undead more easily.

Blood to Salt, when combined with the above strategies, can actually let the player top up on Salts when casting Vigors, as the Salts gain will surpass the cost of casting Undertow and Shock Jockey.

If the player focuses on using one or both of the Shotgun variants, Quick Handed is recommended, as it will drastically reduce reload times.

Hill Runner's Hat comes in handy when fighting the Siren, as her scream attack will break Booker's Shields and the added mobility will allow him to retreat to cover more easily.

For the same reason, Urgent Care can save the player's life, as the combination of the Siren and her minions' attacks will frequently down Booker's Shields.

Using Spectral Sidekick to turn an explosive weapon into an ally will decimate the Siren's minions and heavily damage her at no cost in ammunition. The splash damage is capable of affecting the player, however, so keep some distance from the combat area while the weapon ally is still active.

Ghost Posse/Ghost Soldier will also turn weapons into allies when the enemies who carry them are killed by a Vigor attack.

Originally, the Siren started off as the Resurrector, an old man in a cape described as a "Jonathan Edwards, sinners in the hands of an angry god" character. Irrational found the logic lacking in such a straightforward power of resurrecting the dead. It was too fantastical, and the team wanted something new, different, and sensical for the time period, and they felt that the Siren's 20th century influences would be a fresh improvement.[1]

In The Art of BioShock Infinite, two unused enemy concepts show further evolution into creating the Siren: the Resurrector and the Magician. The Resurrector was revisited, but further revised from its "Old man in a cape" concept, both in its physical appearance, either as a Catholic Cardinal or as a masked Monk, with further reinterpretation in his resurrection abilities as being Stigmata-like. However, the Resurrector idea was eventually dropped. The other exploration was the Magician, whose powers were similar in respawning enemies, only with the addition of telekinetically manipulating the environment. Like the Resurrector, the Magician was also conceptually revised; as a male (either with Art Nouveau-styled mechanized gauntlets and a Splicer-like facade, or a dapper Sander Cohen-like character with a Phrenology-Like painted headpiece), and as a female (mainly in silent-era theatrical makeup, but in different theatrical costumes). Although the Magician would also be dropped from not fitting in the game, a later concept of the female Magician using her abilities would eventually be the link to finally becoming the Siren.

Ken Levine explains one of the inspirations for the Siren: “Siren is a nod to a major social movement at the turn of the century. There was a sense of the spiritual world, and I don’t mean like when you ask people, ‘Oh, are you religious?’ and they say, ‘No. I’m spiritual.’ No, I mean, people were actually talking about contacting the dead and speaking to the dead.”[2]

Spiritualism in America goes back well before the Civil War and had major upswings in popularity happening after large wars when there were numbers of men who not only died, but whose fate was unknown.

Another inspiration for the Siren's ability was of "The Ether", a serious scientific belief of ectoplasm that scientists of the 1900s theorized could be studied for cosmological feats.

Sirens in Greek mythology are evil bird-like creatures who would use their mesmerizing voice to coax passing sailors into wrecking their ships. In a similar vein, the Siren in BioShock Infinite is a female enemy whose voice is powerful enough to resurrect the dead.

The Siren's song is a distorted version of Mozart's Lacrimosa, the third portion of his Requiem. Additionally, the song is played in the Lady Comstock exhibit in the Hall of Heroes, as well as around her crypt in Memorial Gardens.

As the Siren, Lady Comstock's personality and fighting style are reminiscent of the Banshee, an Irish mythical figure that took the form of a woman and screamed at her victims to warn them of the impending death of a loved one, or even their own.

The Siren's design appears to be based on that of a veiled Vestal Virgin, most likely taking inspiration from Raffaele Monti's sculpture "Veiled Vestal Virgin".

The model for these enemies is entitled "seductress," which closely matches Sirens of Greek mythology. However, Sirens portrayed in the game to not display this attribute.

The Siren was originally supposed to be a recurring opponent, and possibly not just Lady Comstock. As with the Boys of Silence, the Siren's role was greatly reduced. The Siren does, however, appear multiple times in Clash in the Clouds.